Understanding why all of this is so stressful.

[2021x]

I have had a lot of stress recently, so have been using AI to get some immediate assistance as I have a pysch appointment next week. One of the themes of what causes me stress is not being heard, or being judged as "hateful" or a "troublemaker". I am estranged from my family, and currently waiting the outcome of a disputes court, a job interview and a house sale so really feeling alot of stress at the moment and small things are causing big feelings.

I have a gay male colleague. We get on really well and are generally quite friendly. A couple of years ago he said something along the lines of "JK Rowling is a Transphobic bitch". It just sort of fell out of his mouth when trying to justify why he bought and played Hogwarts Legacy. The third time he said it I gave him a hard stare and said quietly "come on now" and he hasn't said it since.

He is really keen to promote the "Rainbow" Coalition at work. He wears a rainbow lanyard and is always trying to get people to join the Rainbow Allies Group. He always bakes rainbow cakes and sends rainbow emojis. He was born late 70's and early 80's and has spoken about how he pretended to be straight until he graduated from uni when he was 21 (that would have been difficult to hide). Funnily in the last couple of weeks he has talked about how he hates the "woke" people and would like things to be normal.

I wanted to share an observation that the AI made about the tension I have been feeling and wondered what people thought about. I used the example of my colleague to demonstrate why "I feel so hated for wanting to be heard". After a bit of back and forth about how this situation above makes me feel unsafe at work AI said this.

"That creates a sense of emotional imbalance — like he gets to express his identity loudly, but you have to tiptoe around yours.
That’s what feels unsafe".

Let me know what you think about it. I have been thinking alot about how people who were persecuted then go on to repeat the cycle etc..

I agree with you and have experienced the same, though luckily not from people that I’m particularly close to or care about their opinions of me.

I know there are people who wish I’d just shut up. My problem is not knowing exactly who hates my guts for being a sex realist. It puts me on edge.

I am quite old and been through lots of cycles of feminism. This current one, is the first one that has been played out online. People are emboldened to say terrible things behind their screens and this has split out. Its easy to take what your colleague has said and put it in the same category as the men who have threatened to rape us for speakng out. Because of algorithms, or being on MN, your time online will show you the two extremes of this argument. Your colleague will be flooded with the other side.
Remember 99% of people don't think about it this issue as deeply as you.
Your colleague will have experienced endless homophobia online and in real life. In the 80s being gay was equated with aids the fear and vitriol was horrific. The rainbow flag for most people is a symbol of tolerance. He will have seen the trans debate as a further add on to the abuse.
Had the internet not existed or so new this debate would be very different.
I have spent years debating and improving women's rights and legislation. Particularly working around women who have gone through rape, domestic violence and trafficking. The trans debate has taken the focus and energy away from these as the no 1 issue. And for women undergoing the above it isn't relevant.
As with all campaigning it drains us, and to keep doing it well you need a break, to recharge.
It might be helpful to redirect your focus on other areas offline. Online so much energy is wasted either preaching to the converted, or battling with people who won't listen. It is hugely important to do, but if it is upsetting you this much, it's no use to anybody.
I would take a big break off all social media. If you want to help improve women's lives, think about something you can do offline to help. Raise money for Women's Aid, see if their are volunteer opportunities for helping trafficked women learn English, see if their is a befriending service. Don't focus on your colleague, he is not the place to have the battle. There are other places you can having an impact with improving women's rights without damaging your own mental health. Yes we should challenge things, but we can't win all the battles, we need to think about the bigger picture.

I think your AI results have got it right.

I know in my case, I've worked in several places where the mantra has been 'bring your whole self to work'. Except they only mean that for SOME people.

In fairness, it was like that even before the 'identity' - where I have worked, men could be pushy and even bullying, but if a woman spoke with any level of confidence they were 'shouting' and told to 'calm down' even if they were being totally reasonable and perfectly calm.

And now all that plays out outside of work too - you can suddenly find yourself unwelcome somewhere you've previously felt very comfortable because of the 'toxic debate' which is definitely NOT both sides, despite how that gets mentioned often.

And it doesn't only feel psychologically unsafe, it feels very physically threatening these days too.

Ye, there is an imbalance, and it is extremely unfair. I work for a large public sector employer, and lots of people have links in their email signature explaining why they have pronouns listed. Many of these links are to lobby group websites masquerading as human rights orgs. What would happen if I put a link to Sex Matters in my email signature? It wouldn't be very long before someone would complain that it has made them feel unsafe.

And we are constantly told that we are awful if we deny someone's identity by not completely affirming them. But we are also told that there is no such thing as biological sex. They don't care that the fact of being a biological woman, and getting recognition of that fact, might mean someone to us.

I know how you feel. There are not many people in real life who I can talk to about this. Tried talking to my two best friends (1 male, 1 female, both gay) and while they clearly understood my points and agreed with most of them they just shut down the conversation and concluded 'it was a divisive issue' and that 'it depends on your perspective'. I've also had 'let's agree to disagree'- eh no, because people can't change sex and that's that and I'm not going to give equal weight to 'both sides'.
I don't talk about it with people anymore but I have all the facts to hand if the subject were to come up and could defend my position quite well.
In my son's old school I was surrounded by rainbow people and we were all expected to actively participate in the social transitioning of a little 7 year old boy (to girl). I never said anything about it, except to the principal, but they knew anyway that I wasn't on board. I was constantly on edge and felt under attack and my son was actively bullied by the principal and a bunch of blue haired parents. Both our stress levels are better now that I took my son out.

`But yes, the unequal weight given to some people's opinions takes its toll on your emotional and psychological health. I bet when everyone suddenly sees the light they'll have instant amnesia and forget they ever demonised and shut down people in the first place. Maybe they'll even rewrite history and say it's what they thought all along.

"That creates a sense of emotional imbalance — like he gets to express his identity loudly, but you have to tiptoe around yours.
That’s what feels unsafe".

I think this is a good top line OP. I am sorry that you are under so much stress and I wish you all the best. I think that it is important to spend time away from being online when you can and let your mind rest.

I do understand that in a work situation you feel this imbalance and that if you expressed your opinions as your colleague feels he has the freedom to that it creates a sense of fear. This means that even at work there is a high based level of stress.

I am so sorry you are under so much stress.

I did feel like this at one point but that feeling went away the more I settled into really forming an understanding, which I try to carry lightly.
In conversation I try to avoid anything that will get people's defenses up immediately. With my friends who are onboard with their trans identified children, I can listen and that can give them a safe space to express any doubts and I sit on my hands while they shout into the Facebook ether trying to change the world for their children. If they have doubts, they might need our friendship even more one day.

The word transphobia is pretty much meaningless. It's more of a thought terminating cliche or dog whistle showing people who haven't thought very deeply. Bitch on the other hand - I find it hard to listen to any woman being called a bitch.
My compassion is for the people who thought their lives would change by making drastic changes to themselves and hasn't changed for the better. I feel very sad for them that they pursued something that is futile when they could have been building their life up differently.

I think this is even more of a stressful ideology for any people with autism who just feel it's wrong to lie and by having to play along, it's probably really injurious to them.

I think that AI message was right.
It is like living with ‘stroop effect’.

If you are a woman, I’d say watch out for
gay friends, special though they may be special in many ways. Imo quite a few can be misogynists at heart.

The JKR remark was probably directed to all women in many ways, and showed a lot of hidden aggression.

It's become a hierarchy of oppressed groups, and given those within groups a persmission to punch up, as they see it.

So we have men confidentially calling women bitches, because they have decided their past experience justify it. Men are ignoring womens concerns because those women are old, or rich or white.

If people arent one of the oppression groups, they can become allies, and do the same because they are fighing for the oppressed.

I know the TRAs don't think of it as political, they think they're human rights champions, but does anyone put which political party they support in their email signatures, If they're members of the National Trust, if they voted remain, what their favourite ruddy colour is. I mean it's ridiculous, just out your blooming name and leave all the virtue/opinion stuff at home.

None of us should underestimate the impact of having this ideology enforced on society - especially women and children. Having untruths, especially those relating to porn and fetish, presented as important and a priority via bullying and coercive control, undermines not just society but also our confidence that society is rational and safe.

Parents watching other adults transitioning their children, threatening them if they fail to affirm, smile and bow deeply enough. The workplace where professional standards should be the only standards, yet having to confront the alphabettis & those promoting fantasies, porn and fetish resulting in that becoming yet another unsafe environment.

We all need to step away and let others take up the cause when we feel unsafe and threatened. There are now millions of people starting to recognise what has been hidden by politicians and the media for so long. That this is a dangerous ideology that's caused immense damage to so many - especially the young. It'll take many years to heal the harm that's been done but I do believe that we're finally on the way.

There's some good advice on here OP about stepping away at times.

It's just so unprofessional. I wouldn't put a link to Sex Matters in my email signature because my beliefs or any organisations I show support for are completely irrelevant to my job. But people have a real blind spot when it comes to anything to do with gender identity/pronouns etc. And where I work, managers are probably too afraid to say anything about this because the perpetually offended will kick off. Besides, some managers happily put the progress flag, pronouns etc in their signature themselves.

Members of the public will see these when we email them. And some of the websites people link to are really ridiculous ("have you checked if your colleagues pronouns have changed since you last spoke to them five minutes ago" type nonsense). And we know that some members of the public take a dim view of what public and civil servants get up to. I wish someone with authority would announce that all this needs to stop and all our work communications need to be completely neutral.
We've recently had some changes to our staff network policies and there was outcry over that, with people being very upset that they won't be able to hold their queer book club in staff time anymore 🙄

OP, I posted an article about the cognitive load of just the language demand that could also help.

I think many of us will read about the cognitive load and nod our heads.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5445899-break-it-down-for-me-2-general-break-it-down-archive-thread?reply=150855780&utm_campaign=reply&utm_medium=share

People who understand the problem can't understand people who don't understand the problem.

I mean it seems so obvious, right?

I have come to the conclusion that the only people who care are those that have actually thought about it. The rest are either sheep or parrots.

It's incredibly frustrating.

This rings very true to me working in healthcare. I cannot express my true thoughts and beliefs openly and honestly. If I did, it would damage - and possibly end - my career. All of my feminism activism is secret and yet I am surrounded by fucking rainbows and walking safeguarding risks.

And yes, what about my mental health? Why do others get to be the good guys and I’m the underground resistance.

A couple of months ago there was an interview with Naomi Cunningham (with Martin Geissler on BBC Scotland? Not currently available) in which she hit the nail on the head – at least for me. She said something to the effect that the true believers don't understand that their mindset is religious. They think their views are ones that all right-thinking people should hold, and don't understand that they're the equivalent of religious dress codes, or dietary requirements, or obligatory blessings, or believing in something counterintuitive, like transubstantiation. So when somebody tells them that they don't observe/believe all that stuff, they throw a tizzy. The irony is that a follower of one of the world's great religions would probably not throw a tizzy, because they know that not everyone shares their religion.

I hope that makes sense and doesn't offend anybody. I can't remember her actual wording.

A hospital near me has a rainbow crossing. Some of the people working there have rainbow lanyards. They have portraits on the walls of people who work there who are gay, lesbian, etc. (So called LGBTQ+) and biographies.

It is oppressive and distracting. Also, I don’t understand why anyone one selected umbrella group of worker’s sexual orientations or identities are anybody else’s business.

A good organisation should treat all those who work there with respect. Why are they‘protesting so much’? They seem to be the ones who cannot accept individual differences as normal ( and private).

Which in itself is bizarre considering that most of these people have only held this view of sex and gender for about 5 minutes.

It’s always struck me that the zealotry in rooting out non believers is religious in nature. Basically like “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live”

I also think people get scared (which makes them defensive and angry) when someone questions gender identity ideology in their presence, because they don’t want to slip up. They’ve seen what happens to others. Deep down they know they can’t argue for it rationally. But so much cognitive dissonance goes into propping it up.

"That creates a sense of emotional imbalance — like he gets to express his identity loudly, but you have to tiptoe around yours.
That’s what feels unsafe".

And without wanting to make OP feel any worse about her situation the problem is it isn't just one indiviudual at work you have to allow to have a voice, when you dont have one.

There are so many stories of women being cancelled publicly who are well known, well respected, eg recent thread about woman writer and others.

So not sure whether AI can help but it is for OP and many others knowing that unless you want every minute of your day to be about challenging a "norm" that effectively erases us, we are constantly having to hold our tongue, not feel free to express our opinion.

So to get through each day can feel like a battle or of stiffling oneself.

So unless you have nearby friends you can let off steam with, hopefully FWR will give you a space where you can be your true self.

Or maybe there could be a thread where those who need to can post an account of a situation, or maybe situations that at work have nearly sent them over the top.

But in the meantime can only think that when you are not under the constraints of work, try and do as much as you can that affirms who you are.

In a similar vein there was an excellent comment on an article I read this week (the name escapes me just now, but I am sure I saw it on here too). Essentially it pointed out that the viewpoint of a belief in an unverifiable, un-validated, undefined "feeling" was given equal weight with basic biological scientific fact in this whole argument. It's madness.